After the End(36)

“You look tired,” Nikki says. “Rough night?”

I nod and sit by Dylan’s bed. I want to pull the curtains around us, but it feels rude. I don’t know why I care, but I do.

“Max away again?”

“Yes.” I pull my knitting out of the bag beneath my chair, even though I haven’t touched it in a week, and don’t want to do it now.

“It must be lovely, travelling so much.” There’s no sign of the nervous woman who came in with Liam that day. She’s used to PICU now; she puts her lunch in the family room fridge, and writes down suggestions in the notebook for other parents.

“Mind you, they say you’re just seeing the inside of hotel rooms and airports, don’t they? Where is he this time?”

“Boston.” I say it without thinking, and my pulse quickens as I think what will happen if Max comes in now. How stupid I am, I’ll have to say, I must have been looking at the wrong week . . . My train of thought stops abruptly when Liam makes a noise. A soft sound, not quite a moan, but decidedly more than a breath.

“Did you hear that?” Nikki’s voice is sharp with hope. She stands up, her chair legs scraping against the floor. Cheryl has already taken swift strides across the room, and is leaning over Liam. They took him off the ventilator the day before yesterday, his body gradually ridding itself of the drugs used to keep him sedated. A waiting game, Nikki told me, trying to be brave, and I’d squeezed her arm and said Been there, got the T-shirt.

Liam moans again—the unmistakable sound of a child waking up—and Nikki stifles a cry.

“I’m here, baby, Mum’s here.”

I stand and pull the curtain between Liam’s bed and Dylan’s, and mutter Give you some privacy, but no one hears because on that side of the curtain it’s all He’s waking up, he’s really waking up! and Liam coughing and Cheryl calling for Yin to give him some water, just tiny sips—not too fast, and here on this side of the curtain my boy is quiet and still and pale, and I can’t, I just can’t.

Outside the hospital I lean against the wall, my breath ragged and painful, like I’ve been running. I haven’t got my coat but I start walking regardless, needing to clear my head before I go back in. I head for the parade of shops two streets away, and walk aimlessly around the small supermarket, filling my basket with treats for the family room. The checkout queue snakes back through tinned goods, so I head for the self-service tills.

“It’s there!” I mutter, passing a bottle of water across the scanner for a third time, a fourth time. “You’re literally looking at it!”

A woman at the next till chuckles. “I’m glad I’m not the only one who talks to these things.” I smile, continuing to scan my shopping and drop it into the bag on the right.

“Please place the item in the bag,” says the machine, a second after I’ve loaded a packet of chocolate chip cookies.

“It is in the bag.”

There’s another chuckle of solidarity from the woman next to me, who has almost finished her shopping and is tapping in her PIN.

“Please place the item in the bag.”

I think about Liam, and wonder if he’s sitting up, if he’s alert enough to speak yet. I pick up the cookies and drop them again.

“Please place the item in the bag.”

I wonder if Dylan noticed me leave, if he’s confused, if he misses me. Guilt washes over me. “It’s in the bloody bag!” I slam the cookies down so hard I hear them crack.

The woman next to me doesn’t chuckle this time.

“Please place the item in the bag.”

Sweat breaks out across my forehead, tears of frustration pricking at my eyes and making my nose run. I pick up the cookies and keep them in my fist and I raise my arm high and smash them onto my shopping bag again and again and again as I shout each word louder and louder and louder. “It. Is. In. The. Fucking. Bag.” I’m vaguely aware of people around me, of the crackle of a radio, and an Are you all right, love? and of a firm hand on my arm.

I shake it off and take a step back. The air fizzes with whispers and stares, the queue for the till misshapen with onlookers stepping out to see. The no-longer-chuckling woman looks away as I catch her staring.

The hand belonged to a man in a black suit and a neon jacket, a radio clipped to his belt. He looks uncertain, and I think he must be more accustomed to dealing with shoplifters and underage wannabes than thirty-five-year-old women having breakdowns over automated tills. I pull the strap of my handbag more firmly onto my shoulder, jerk my chin upwards, and leave. I’m back at the hospital before I realise I’m still holding the cookies.



* * *





Is your husband coming in today?” Dr. Khalili can’t know that my husband spent the night at a hotel, but her voice is as kind as if she did. It’s after lunch, and I’ve heard nothing from Max. After the initial flurry of excitement, Liam is still again, Nikki glued to his side. Waiting, waiting.

“I—I’m not sure.” I hesitate. “What will happen if he . . . if we can’t agree?”

“You’re not the first parents to have a difference of opinion on a course of treatment,” Dr. Khalili says. “We can offer mediation—someone independent who can help you reach a decision you’re both happy with, and then—”